


ABC's of Ancient Technology

by Minnicoops



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: ABC Challenge, Ancient Devices, Gen, Humor, Team Fluff, Weird Side Effects, pretty silly
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-14
Updated: 2021-03-15
Packaged: 2021-03-22 01:14:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,866
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30030777
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Minnicoops/pseuds/Minnicoops
Summary: The Ancients created a lot of amazing technology. They also made some... questionable devices. A series of one-shots featuring times the Atlantis crew had some more humorous encounters with Ancient technology.
Comments: 4
Kudos: 19





	1. A is for Alfred

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: How many times do I have to say it? I don't own Stargate. I don't need that kind of responsibility in my life.
> 
> A/N: So here's some utter silliness that I wrote in between working on my other stories (yes, I am still working on those series, fear not). The idea for this series might have been a little bit inspired by my recent rewatch of Warehouse 13... But I've always enjoyed the idea of Ancient technology not always behaving as it should. I hope it makes you chuckle as much as it made me when I wrote it.
> 
> Unlike my other stories, this is a series of one-shots that will be updated sporadically as I finish them.
> 
> Big thanks to the lovely StaticWarpBubble for the beta! As usual, blame me for any mistakes.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sometimes, the residents of Atlantis wish the city came with better instructions. Or, the one in which the crew learns to be careful what they wish for. Set in season one.

End of the week meetings were not John’s favorite thing. Mostly because they fell on Friday afternoons, which were rarely the end of _his_ week. Tuesday was most commonly his day off, and sometimes Wednesday if he was lucky, though even his “off” days usually involved him working in some capacity. Still, most of the civilians worked a normal week and by Friday afternoon, they had checked out mentally, meaning meetings got off track easily and therefore lasted much longer than was strictly necessary.

The one silver lining was that there were always plenty of snacks, the good kind that somehow magically appeared only on Friday afternoons and were impossible to find any other time of the week. John wasn’t sure where Elizabeth was hiding her stash of Little Debbie snack cakes, but she seemed to have an endless supply and was not above using them as a bribe to get him and a couple of the other “busier” heads of departments to make time in their schedules for the meeting. Of course, the thing that had actually convinced him to attend regularly was her flat out telling him that she expected him to be there and not to schedule off world missions for Fridays.

John got that it was important for everyone to be informed of what was going on in the city, and the point of these meetings was to get on the same page about the mission schedule and the work being done in the city. Those parts he was mostly okay with, though he was still getting used to the balance between the military and civilian side of the leadership hierarchy and how that played out in determining where they went and what they did. The part of the meeting that he _couldn’t_ stand was the “professional development” portion, which was supposed to be a short presentation from one of the science teams about their work. Except, it inevitably always went longer than the allotted fifteen minutes and always left John wondering if this research was really worth the millions of tax dollars that had been pumped into sending these scientists all the way out here.

Today, McKay and Zelenka were tag-teaming the presentation, and as usual, were way too excited for a Friday afternoon. John only half listened as they began, talking over each other and arguing about details that really made no difference to anyone except them. He was just starting to doze off when something Rodney said caught his attention.

“We’ve decided to name him Alfred,” McKay announced, beaming.

“No,” Zelenka mumbled. “ _You_ decided that. I think we should call him Data. He is more similar to the android from _Star Trek_ than the butler from _Batman_.”

What the heck were they naming this time? John ran a hand over his face to wake himself up and squinted at the powerpoint that was projected on the wall. Looked like a bunch of gobbledy-gook to him, but he did manage to see a few words that he recognized. Hologram, instruction manual, city-wide helper.

“That doesn’t make any sense,” Rodney argued. “If we were going to name him after a _Star Trek_ character it would have to be the Doctor from _Voyager_ , but he’s not a doctor. He’s more like a butler. Case in point: Alfred.”

“But his purpose is to give us information, which is why he is more similar to Data,” Zelenka argued back.

“Data had his own place on the crew,” Rodney said. “Hell, he had his own personality. This is way more similar to—”

“McKay,” John interrupted, waving a hand at him to quit talking. “Who cares what we name it? Tell me again exactly what this thing does.”

Rodney’s eyes lit up, knowing he had everyone’s full attention if _John_ was asking him questions. “It’s a helper program. Like an instruction manual for Ancient technology, but interactive so you can ask it questions.” He held up the shield device that he’d accidentally trapped himself in a couple of months ago. “For example… Alfred?”

A little man dressed in Ancient garb appeared out of thin air in the middle of the room. He was short, barely five feet tall, and did have a distinct butler vibe to him. “Greetings. How may I assist you?”

Zelenka’s mouth opened in outrage. “You already programmed him to respond to ‘Alfred’ without consulting me?”

Rodney ignored him and smiled smugly at his audience. “I would like to know the specifications of this device,” he said, holding out the shield.

“That is a personal shield device. If placed upon the body and activated, it will protect the user from bodily harm.”

Elizabeth quirked an interested eyebrow as Rodney continued. “And how do you disengage the device?”

“The device can be disengaged by thought once the user is no longer in danger,” the hologram said. John thought his tone was rather condescending. 

“Thank you, Alfred.”

“It is my pleasure,” the hologram responded before flickering out.

“You said this thing works everywhere?” John asked, leaning forward on his elbows. 

Zelenka, who was still shooting irritated glances at Rodney, nodded. “Yes. Unlike the other hologram in the map room, this one seems to have the capability to appear anywhere in the city.”

“Very nice, gentlemen,” Elizabeth said. “Seems like this will be a helpful tool in learning how to use the technology we still haven’t figured out.”

Both McKay and Zelenka puffed out their chests, looking very pleased with themselves.

John eyed them suspiciously, not as taken with the hologram as everyone else seemed to be. He knew how this worked. Often, when those two got excited about a new Ancient doodad, they overlooked some important feature making it not as great as it appeared to be. If this hologram was so amazing, why hadn’t it been on from the start? “Are we sure there aren’t going to be any weird, I dunno, glitches or anything? Sometimes Ancient tech is a little...” He made a face to show how much he trusted it.

“I promise, Sheppard,” Rodney told him with a grin, “Alfred is going to change life as we know it on Atlantis.”

“We’ll just see about that,” John mumbled under his breath as the meeting moved on to the status of the ongoing maintenance projects throughout the city, which would inevitably be the same as last week’s update.

*****

Rodney was checking his email as he was walking back to his office from lunch, head buried in his tablet, when he suddenly found himself being yanked out of the hallway and into a tiny dark room. He let out a yelp of surprise, nearly dropping his tablet as his hands went up to protect his head.

“Rodney!” a voice hissed next to his ear. “Calm down, it’s me.”

Rodney squinted at the dark shape standing far too close to him and identified the spikey hair. “Sheppard?” he squawked. “What are you doing?”

“We need to talk,” Sheppard said conspiratorially.

“And we couldn’t do that in one of the hundreds of well lit rooms Atlantis has to offer like normal people instead of in here like a couple of drug dealers?” Rodney asked indignantly.

Sheppard hushed him. “No, he might be listening.”

Rodney couldn’t quite see his face in the dark space, but he could hear the paranoia in his friend’s voice. “What are you talking about?” he hissed.

“Alfred,” Sheppard whispered, as if that explained it.

This brought Rodney up short. “Are we seriously hiding from a _hologram_ right now?” he whisper-yelled. “In a—what even is this? A closet?”

“Shh!” Sheppard insisted, poking his head out of the doorway and looking around. “He has ears everywhere.”

Rodney wrenched himself out of Sheppard’s grasp and made to leave. “This is ridiculous.”

Sheppard put up an arm to block the doorway. “No, just hear me out. That thing is evil. He’s like Hal. I swear he’s out to get me.”

“Hal?”

“Yeah, you know, the killer computer from _2001: A Space Odyssey_.”

“I know who Hal is. I’m just surprised that you’ve seen _2001: A Space Odyssey_.”

“McKay!”

“Sorry,” Rodney said, shaking his head. “I know, I know. It seems we didn’t fully understand the programming before we activated him. I thought he was only supposed to pop up when we asked him to, but there’s all kinds of subroutines that activate him when he senses someone needs his help. That doesn’t make him evil, though—just annoying. Clippy would be a better analogy than Hal.”

“Clippy?” Now it was Sheppard’s turn to be confused.

“Yeah, you know. The little paperclip in Microsoft Word that used to pop up to give you unsolicited advice to help ‘improve’ your document. I swear that thing never shut up. They eventually killed it off because everyone hated it so much.”

“Then, yes. He’s like Clippy,” Sheppard said. “And you need to kill him off.”

“Yeah, I know. You didn’t have to drag me into a dark closet to tell me that. I’m working on it.”

“Well, work faster.”

“Sheppard—”

“The thing keeps showing up in my bathroom, McKay. Trying to explain how to use the shower. While I’m _in_ the shower!”

Rodney held up a hand to stop him before he went into any more details. “I know. He’s been showing up everywhere, irritating everyone. He popped up in the mess hall this morning to lecture me for eating a donut.” Alfred had pointed out that Rodney was severely lacking in the essential vitamins and minerals provided by fruits and vegetables and had suggested if he continued to eat the way he was he would significantly shorten his life expectancy. “But it’s not so easy. There isn’t a simple switch to turn him off. He’s wired into the essential functions of the city, and once he’s activated, he can’t be turned off without potentially turning off something important. I have to manually go in and cancel out every command that he’s programmed to react to, and whenever I think I’ve gotten them all, I find out there’s another one.”

“See?” Sheppard said. “I told you he’s evil!”

“Not evil, he just has complex programming. I’ll get them all eventually.”

“Better make it soon, because I don’t know how much more of this I can handle,” Sheppard growled. “I’ve been looking over my shoulder for two weeks now, waiting for that thing to pop up. He’s making me crazy.”

“He’s making everyone crazy, not just you,” Rodney agreed. “I promise, I’ll get rid of him. You just have to be a little patient.”

The look on Sheppard’s face said exactly how he felt about being patient, but he dropped his arm and moved out of the closet. “Just get it done,” he repeated, throwing a paranoid glance down the hall before stalking away.

*****

“Well, I figured out why Alfred was so annoying,” McKay announced at the next Friday afternoon meeting.

“Excuse me,” Zelenka said. “ _You_ figured it out?”

McKay rolled his eyes. “Fine,” he amended. “It was a joint effort.”

“I believe _I_ was the one who—”

“Gentlemen,” Elizabeth interrupted, giving the two scientists a sharp look before the argument dissolved this conversation further. “Please, enlighten us.”

Zelenka at least had the decency to look bashful for arguing about who should be credited with the discovery, leaving McKay to continue his explanation. “Alfred was designed to be an educational tool for children.”

“Like... a teacher?” Sheppard asked.

“More like a nanny. It was supposed to teach them the basics of the city and all the other stuff the Ancients were too busy to teach their own kids.”

“Apparently, the Ancients employed this use of technology often, as seen with the hologram in the map room,” Zelenka added. “However, Alfred was designed to be much more interactive and to be used with younger children. Imagine all the tasks a small child would need assistance with, like using the restroom, getting dressed, learning to interact with others…” He blushed as he mentioned the last bit, again embarrassed because Alfred had popped up on more than one occasion to break up an argument between him and McKay. 

“If this was a program designed for little kids, how come he was appearing to us?” Sheppard asked. “Last time I checked, none of us are kids.”

“Uh, well,” Rodney said, and then cleared his throat. “We may have bypassed some of the initial settings to, uh, get him to work.”

There wasn’t one person in the meeting who wasn’t glaring at McKay.

“But you turned him off now, right?” Elizabeth asked. She had been more irritated with the complaints about Alfred than with the hologram itself, but was ready to be done with it nonetheless.

“We believe we finally tracked down all the commands that made him pop up, yes,” Rodney said. “He shouldn’t be bothering us anymore.”

“Thank God,” Sheppard muttered, picking the chocolate shell off his Swiss Cake Roll. “If he popped up one more time to tell me not to...” He suddenly noticed everyone was looking at him and trailed off. “So I guess Mary Poppins would have been a more accurate name, huh?” he said quickly, shifting the conversation back to the hologram.

Rodney sighed heavily and rolled his eyes. “Fine. Go ahead and say it.”

“Say what?” Sheppard asked, feigning innocence as he glanced around at the rest of the staff in the meeting. Everyone’s eyes were going back and forth between the two men. “Oh, you mean, ‘I told you so?’” He grinned smugly. “Because I did.”

“Let’s just be glad the problem is fixed and move on,” Elizabeth said, both to rescue the two embarrassed scientists and keep the meeting moving before another argument broke out. “If there’s nothing else…?”

“Uh, well, there is one more thing,” Zelenka stuttered. “As you know, part of the problem in removing Alfred was that he was tied in to so many of the main systems in Atlantis…”

“Yes?” Elizabeth drawled, prompting him to continue.

“It-it seems that, in removing him, we’ve also accidentally… Unintentionally—”

“We deleted part of the Ancient database,” Rodney blurted out.

Everyone stared at him in shock. “You did what?” Elizabeth asked.

“Just a small part!” Rodney defended. “A fraction, really. Mostly children’s stories and songs.” He dropped his gaze and mumbled quickly, “And just a tiny bit about how to use some of the devices in the labs.” 

“Rodney!” Elizabeth chastised, shooting him a stern look.

“It was just the smallest little bit, I swear,” Rodney said quickly. “Nothing of vital importance. We’ll be fine.”

She continued to frown at him severely, but eventually sighed and shook her head. Nothing to be done about it right now. They would have to look into it later. “All right. _Now_ , if you’re finished, we need to move on with the rest of our meeting so we can all get out of here and enjoy our weekend.”

“For those of us who get a weekend,” Sheppard grumbled quietly, stuffing more Swiss Cake Roll in his mouth.

Elizabeth’s eyes rolled to the ceiling and she took a breath to get her annoyance under control. On second thought, maybe a holographic nanny wasn’t the worst thing ever. Half her staff acted like children anyway. Funny how Alfred hadn’t bothered her all that much, and, in fact, had actually given her a break from the constant supervision these men required.

Taking another deep breath, she pushed the thought out of her mind and refocused on the meeting topic. “Doctor Ishihara, I believe you are doing our presentation today?”


	2. B is for Baked

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Ancients knew how to party, too. Or, the one in which some members of the expedition get a little stoned. Set in season two.

"Ally bally, ally bally bee, sittin' on yer mammy's knee. Greetin' for a wee bawbee, tae buy some Coulter's candy."

Teyla smiled, unable to hide her amusement as she helped a drunkenly weaving Carson down the hallway. He swung his head toward her and grinned. "Ma used to sing me thot ev'ry night afore bed. Will ye sing with me, Teyla, luv? It's an easy 'nuff tune tae pick up."

Between the slight slur and the thickness his accent had taken on, Teyla had only caught about seventy-five percent of what he had been saying to her during their stroll to the infirmary. "I believe you should sing, Carson, and I will listen," she suggested.

He immediately broke out with the tune again, apparently not at all offended by her refusal to join him. "Poor wee Jeanie's gettin' awfy thin, a rickle o' banes covered ower wi' skin. Mammy gie's ma thrifty doon..." he trailed off. "Ach, no! I've gone and mixed up th' wee verse! How does it go again...?" He started over, jovially belting the words as they reached the infirmary doors.

"Ah, 'Lizabeth!" he cheered when the doors opened to reveal the woman waiting inside. "I was jus' teaching the lass here 'bout Scottish heritage. You mus' know Ally Bally Bee. Sing with me!"

Elizabeth chuckled as Carson broke back out into song again. "That's lovely, Carson. I'm sure Teyla appreciates your song." She shared an exasperated look with the other woman. "Doctor Biro was worried when you left earlier. Let's make sure we stay in the infirmary from now on, okay?"

Doctor Biro was currently trying to convince an uncooperative Sheppard to lie down for a scan. "I don't need to be here, Doc," he was saying in the same drunken tone Carson had. "Told you. I'm perfectly fine. Healthiest I've ever been."

"Colonel Sheppard, if you don't lie down and let me do this scan, I will restrain you," Biro told him firmly.

Ronon, who had been standing near Elizabeth, strode over to help. "I'll do it," he told the frazzled doctor, and reached over to hold Sheppard down on the bed.

"Ronon!" Sheppard exclaimed. "There you are! Hey, I was thinking, we should take a puddle jumper out and I could teach you how to surf. You'd be great at it. What do you say, buddy?"

"Maybe later," Ronon replied patiently as Sheppard continued to try and roll out of his grasp.

Teyla walked Carson to the nearest empty bed and deposited him there. Thankfully, he seemed to be fully engaged in remembering every verse of his song and didn't resist.

Sighing, Teyla turned back to Elizabeth. "Do we know if anyone else has been affected?"

The infirmary was bustling with people, patients who were acting just as drunk as Beckett and Sheppard and also the staff keeping an eye on them. They had quickly learned that in this altered state, none of the patients were listening very well to the "you have to stay here" directions, and that many of them were regular Houdinis when it came to sneaking out without anyone noticing. After the fourth jailbreak, they'd called in extra bodies to help keep everyone in place.

"So far it's just these five, plus Major Lorne, whom Lieutenant Kennel is escorting back right now," Elizabeth answered, watching the antics of the patients. Sheppard had switched from arguing to laughing, tears streaming from his eyes as he tried to squirm away from Ronon, claiming the man was tickling him. McKay was poking the food on his tray and looking at it with fascination, like he'd made an exciting new discovery. Miko Kusanagi was staring into space and mumbling frantically under her breath. One of the nurses was wrestling a jar of cotton balls away from Sergeant Stackhouse, who claimed they were marshmallows and that he wanted to make s'mores.

Doctor Biro joined them, letting Ronon continue to convince Sheppard to stay in the infirmary. He had been tricky enough to track down the last time he escaped.

"Well," Biro said, "I was wrong. Looks like the effect of the device is more similar to cannabis than alcohol."

Elizabeth did a double take. "You're saying they're high?"

Biro nodded with a wince. "Utterly and completely stoned. It's not exactly the same, but close enough. Thankfully, there don't seem to be any negative physical effects, so I don't think they're in any danger." A timely thump interrupted her as Miko rolled off the bed and giggled, a nurse immediately hurrying to help her back up. Biro sighed, watching the scene. "Except from themselves, of course. But I suppose the other good news is that they all seem to be enjoying themselves."

"And the bad news?" Elizabeth prompted.

Doctor Biro shook her head. "We won't know how to reverse it, or even if there _is_ a way to reverse it, until we can figure out how the device works."

Elizabeth let out a sigh. That was going to be the tricky part. "Has there been any change since we moved it into the shielded lab?"

"It looks like the effects are diminishing, but very slowly," Biro said. "It could be a few days before they return to normal at this rate. But there haven't been any new cases, so the shielding seems to at least be keeping the rest of the ATA carriers from joining this party. It's only affecting those who were in proximity to the lab when Doctor McKay triggered the device."

Speaking of the devil... "Sheppard!" Rodney exclaimed, excitement lighting up his face. "I think I figured it out! The answer, you know? To life, the universe, and everything!"

Sheppard sat up, matching the scientist's expression. "42?"

"What? Oh, no, no, no." Rodney waved a hand at him. "That's just a book. And a terrible movie. I mean, honestly, the only redeeming factor in that entire film was the musical number with the dolphins right at the beginning." He got a goofy smile on his face and sang, "So long, and thanks for all the fish..." Then, remembering that he had been about to say something of vital importance, he continued, "But this, this is for real."

"What is it?" Sheppard pried, his eyes wide as he leaned so far forward that Ronon had to catch his shoulder so he didn't topple off the bed.

"Tater tots!" McKay said, tossing a couple of the tots from his plate at Sheppard and hitting him squarely in the forehead. They both broke out into hysterical giggles.

All three women tried very hard not to laugh. "As entertaining as this is for both them and us, I would like to have our people back to normal as soon as possible," Elizabeth noted.

The infirmary door opened to let in Lieutenant Kennel, who was escorting Major Lorne by the elbow. "But Kennel, did you see it?" the major was asking with excitement, trying to turn around and head back the way they'd come.

"Yes, sir," Kennel said in a tone that rivaled that of a parent talking to a toddler as he guided his team leader further into the room. "I saw it."

"But, it was so—"

"Yes, sir, it was very blue," Kennel interrupted, rolling his eyes toward the women to show he had heard this a few times already. "The sky is usually blue. Almost every day, in fact." He led a petulant Lorne to the bed across from Carson, who had moved on to another song that was either in Gaelic or his accent had gotten too strong to identify the words. "Stay here, sir," Kennel told Lorne, sitting him on the bed.

"Hey!" Lorne protested, looking irritated that Kennel wasn't excited enough about the color of the sky. "Who gives the orders around here, Lieutenant?"

"That would be me, Major," Biro said. "Now let's go take a scan. You ran out of here before I got to you earlier." He grumbled, but dutifully followed her, nearly face-planting when he hopped off the bed.

"I'm going to go check in with Doctor Zelenka," Elizabeth said, "see if he's made any progress."

Teyla gave her a nod and smile of acknowledgment. She was content to stay here and help for now. Not just because she was always willing to help care for her teammates and friends, but because she was gaining some interesting insight into their personalities while they were in their altered states.

"Teyla, luv, you know the words," Carson said from where he was hanging half upside-down off the bed. "Sing with me now! Ally bally, ally bally bee..."

*****

"This might be the worst hangover I've ever had," Sheppard groaned, laying his head on the table next to his untouched plate of food.

Teyla winced sympathetically. "Doctor Biro said the side effects of the withdrawal should pass within a few hours. Until then, she recommended you stay hydrated and try not to overexert yourself."

"I knew I should have just stayed in bed," McKay complained from a posture similar to Sheppard's. "I overexerted myself just by getting up."

"Drink some juice, McKay," Ronon suggested, pushing the glass closer to his tray. "It'll help."

McKay lifted his head enough to glare at the man, but he sipped at the juice obediently. "Can't believe we spent two days high as a kite," he murmured, making a face and picking something out of his cup. "Why would the Ancients invent a device with the sole purpose to get you stoned out of your mind? What's the point?"

Teyla and Ronon exchanged an amused look, which made the scientist's eyes narrow with suspicion.

"What?" he demanded.

"I cannot say for certain why the Ancients created such a device," Teyla said in a smooth voice, "but Doctor Zelenka believes that the reason may have been... Recreational."

"Recreational?" McKay squeaked in outrage. "You mean they did that for fun? On purpose?"

"You seemed to be enjoying yourself," Ronon pointed out with a smirk. "Most fun I've ever seen you have. Maybe it wasn't such a bad thing."

Rodney sputtered, unsure how to respond to that. "I would never... Drugs waste perfectly good brain cells," he finally spat out.

"Calm down, Rodney," Sheppard said, lifting his head and squinting at the sunlight coming in through the mess hall's windows. "We weren't _doing drugs_. The device just messed with us temporarily. It's not the end of the world."

"Maybe not for you," McKay argued, growing more passionate. "I can barely remember what I did for two days!"

Teyla wasn't quite fast enough to cover up the snort of laughter. Both McKay and Sheppard regarded her with hesitant interest.

"Do we want to know?" Sheppard asked.

She debated for a moment how much to tell them. She didn't think John would be embarrassed by his behavior, more because he wasn't easily embarrassed than because he hadn't done anything to warrant it. Rodney might be slightly more sensitive after learning some of the details of their inebriation, as he tended to be more insecure about himself to begin with. But she had not been the only one to witness their antics, which meant it would likely all come out eventually, and it might be better for them to hear it from a friend first.

"For the most part, you merely found everything to be very humorous," she began, choosing her words carefully. "But there was a point when Carson suggested that you join him in singing, and from there, Rodney, you had the idea to perform a play..." Ronon's eyes danced with laughter as she trailed off.

John and Rodney stared at her, possibly remembering fragments of the musical they had put on for the medical staff (and as many others as would fit in the cramped infirmary). It had been impressive, really, that the six affected patients had been able to organize themselves well enough to put together a show that was halfway sensible.

After a long pause, Rodney asked quietly, "Did we sing a song about the Stargate? And the Wraith?"

Again, it took all of her control to not laugh as she remembered the songs. She couldn't help the wide smile on her face. "Yes. And there was a song about the ZPM as well. I never knew you had such a beautiful singing voice, Rodney."

"Oh, God," Sheppard moaned, the horrified look on his face indicating that he, too, was remembering the event. "And I made Lorne be me because I wanted to be the Wraith."

Ronon couldn't hold back the laughter anymore, which nearly set Teyla off as well. The major had done a rather impressive, if not over-exaggerated, impersonation of his commanding officer. "And Carson played me," she added, remembering the high pitched voice and the way he kept pretending to toss his hair over his shoulder. "And Miko played Doctor Weir, and Sergeant Stackhouse provided the sound effects."

Rodney had turned bright red and was slowly slouching further into his seat. "Please tell me no one recorded it," he begged weakly.

Ronon raised a mischievous eyebrow. "Sorry, McKay, can't do that."

He put his head in his hands with a pitiful moan. "Why would you let us go through with that?"

"It kept you all in the infirmary, focused on a productive goal," Teyla explained kindly. "Before that some of you made multiple attempts to wander off." She glanced meaningfully at John here. "And it did not cause any harm. In fact, you were all quite proud of it."

John looked at her with all seriousness. "What would I have to give you to help me make that recording disappear?"

**Author's Note:**

> Love it? Hate it? Let me know by hitting that comment button!


End file.
